Why isn't the main stream media - including the Post - talking about the GAO report last week about the irregularities in the 2004 Ohio vote? The GAO found 180,000 questionable votes. The Ohio vote wasn't certifiable but was anyway. We may have a stolen election, an imposter in the White House.

Why is it the Republicans fear the truth so much they will do everything they can to stop all investigations? That can only mean they have lots of stuff to hide.

Question for the audience:

[Note: Any Copyright Attorneys in the House.....I reserve First Use claims!]

Has anyone yet heard or seen the phrase: "Wag the Judge"?

candide: did you also oppose John Kerry because he is Catholic? (Note: the word "papist" was officially retired sometime during the Kennedy Administration. Do you also refer to black people as "Negros" or worse?? Are you troubled that Jews represent 2.3% of the US population but 11% of the Senate and 2 of 9 Supreme Court seats?)

There's nothing wrong with judicial activism, and the right has consistently shown their hypocrisy on this issue: they'll support any judicial activism as long as it's conservative, and oppose it whenever it's liberal. It has everything to do with political ideology, and nothing to do with judicial philosophy.

OH-4: I'm pretty sure there are some current or former state legislators who'd be suited to run for Oxley's seat, though I can't think of any names at the moment. Rep. Paul Gillmor's wife Karen, a former state senator, might as well run for it. I remember when neither of them lived in their districts anyway and the OH Democratic Party bought a billboard reading "Paul and Karen Gillmor: If you lived in your district, you'd be home by now".

http://sandwichrepair.blogspot.com

I guess I might be one of the few Democrats who agrees with idea of ridding judicial activism. Although, I do find it interesting that the right in our country is using "strict interpretation of the constitution" as a sign of judicial activism. This is the same philosophy that in the late nineteenth century interpreted the fourteenth ammendment to cover corporations thereby nullifying any anti-trust laws. This philosophy also called Plessy v. Ferguson a good decision and Brown v. Board of Education "judicial activism". An activist Supreme Court struck down many of Roosevelt's new deal policies in the 30s. People should keep perspective about what judicial activism really is and not be taken by propoganda. This is a political battle, not a disagreement on judicial philosophy.

Katie: I don't think the Papists will like your calling their church a "sect." Of course it is a sect -- all of Christianity is a group of sects partcipating in a mass delusion.

come on people, dissing ethinic groups is way off topic and something the repugs would do. Attck his record, and yes, five members of one religous sect is not a healthy mix on the court, but attacking his ethnic roots is stupid and immature. Unless his record shows he's "connected".

Roe v Wade, Gay Rights, Family Values et al.....all Red Herrings. Smoke screens. The Corporate Right want a Justice who is user friendly to their interests. Alito is the man. They want the current pay-as-you-go system of campaign financing to stay as it is because it conveniently allows them to put "their boys and girls" in the legislature and protect them from the Middle Class. Our lovely democracy will continue to be sold to the highest bidder.
Jeff Rollins
Valencia, CA

Tom: only in San Francisco can these wretched Italo-Americans get clean. It has something to do with the air, or perhaps with the fact that they are less numerous than in NY, MA, or Chicago.

Tom: I grew up among these wretched mafia types in the northeast. A sweet little Italian girl next door grew up and murdered her husband and got away with it. I remember finding out and telling my dad: Dad, do you remember .......... next door? She murdered her husband somewhere near Newburg, NY and got away with it. He was not surprised either. He also had lived with these wretched people.

I am not sure I want a second Italian and fifth Catholic on the Court.

Tom: being rational and fair does not have to mean being stupid. Das Blut spricht immer wahr.

ah, candide. how i've missed you! once again, you introduce into the blogosphere an idea that is both stupid and bigoted. you were born 40 years too late -- you would have been a great propagandist for the third reich. voltaire is spinning in his grave.

The GOP wants a fight. I'll give them a fight. Why did Bush pick an Italo-American from New Jersey, the most mafia-controlled state except for Louisiana?

Robert:

Get used to it? Harldy.

The current right wing "vise grip" on the federal government is tenuous at best.

There is widespread disatisfaction with
President Bush and the Republican led Congress. As of now according to recent polling information your party is in deep
trouble with midterms coming up. The independents are turning against you.

All politics is cyclical and while you repubs have had a nice run its apparent
you dont know how to govern when you do have the power to do so. this has been proven by your incompetence while in the
majority.

"Overturning Roe V. Wade is an example of legislating from the bench, because this would never be overturned at the ballot box."

Impossible to know this until Roe v. Wade is overturned and the decision is given back to the people and their representatives. No, actually there is a way. The voters can vote on this indirectly, by voting for those who select Supreme Court Justices: the President and the Senators. And by that measure, the majority of this country want Roe v Wade overturned.

"Americans need to see that the GOP is a party in the vise grip of the right wing."

The GOP is the majority party all over this country because it is "in the vise grip of the right wing." Get used to it. The right wing is the majority of this country.

Why not do a "women only vote" on the abortion issue?

doesnt it make sense, because it is their bodies that would be medically affected by the abortion procedure?

I think you would find that overwhelmingly among females (enen republican) that they would reserve the right to choose.

I agree with Steve. I think that abortion should be decided in state legislatures where the decision-makers are subject to voter approval every 2-4 years. If that were the case then none of us on either side of the debate would have to wait for that moment in every one or two lifetimes when the balnace of the Supreme Court is up for grabs. It was interesting during the Roberts hearing that pro-choice Democrats were arguing that Roe is established law and should not be overturned. It was judicial activism that created Roe, therefore, judicial activism can overturn it. Leave to the legislative bodies of this nation.

The Supreme Court is there to see that laws passed by the Congress and states pass Constitutional muster. If a law is popular or not is not what the Supreme Court is there for. Scalia has said that if a state passes a legalized abortion law, that is of no concern to the Supreme Court because that power resides in the states. Justices are not there to be popular but to be Constitutional. Returning power to the voters is nothing to fear.

Actually, a woman's right to choose would be overturned at the ballot box in certain states.

Alito is against the Family Medical Leave Act. How can Republicans survive if they support such an anti-family position? Everyone and their brother supports the FMLA! Everyone and their brother has been affected by the FMLA at work. But Alito is against it? Talk about a Judicial Activist.

It will be awfully hard for the GOP to ask for an up-or-down vote with a straight face, considering they were clearly not willing to give Miers that latitude.

It is time for the Dems to get the GOP to spell out what they really want in a Supreme Court justice, which is, first-and-foremost, the judicial reversing of Roe V. Wade.

Overturning Roe V. Wade is an example of legislating from the bench, because this would never be overturned at the ballot box.

A sizeable majority of Americans support a woman's right-to-choose. Making it clear that this man will overturn that decision should be the crystal-clear Democratic strategy.

Americans need to see that the GOP is a party in the vise grip of the right wing.

It spells doom for Republicans in 2006. But lasting damage will be wrought if this man is sworn in as a Supreme Court justice.

George Bush will have the legacy he deserves. An incompetent divider.

I understand that in alot of cases in the last two years it has been the working stratedgy of the DNC to give the GOP enough rope, they'll hang themselves. Time to gird up their loins and do battle. Also trying to get out their alternatives to BushCo policies would be alot easier if they chastised the MSM for not giving them the kind of coverage the GOPers get. I'm sure the DNC has some great alternative policies but don't get the coverage needed to let the public know. I know, the ruling party gets the airwaves, but just how helpful is that to the American public? TV media is especially to blame on this. If Boxer or anyone else speaks about policy alternatives, we get a couple of soundbites taken out of context, yet we have TV shows cancelled to listen to Bush speak at a luncheon and drag out the same,old, shallow rhetoric. One can only pray that six moderate GOP senators will serve their voters not the party.
How sad to see the country potentially going backward in time.